1. Field of the Invention
This invention is concerned with hypoxically-inducible expression control sequences, nucleic acid constructs comprising such sequences, and their use for selective targeting of anti-cancer therapy and other kinds of therapy where target cells are affected by hypoxia.
2. Detailed Description of the Related Art
Vile and Hart (1993) describe a method in which certain gene promoters, which are preferentially active in melanocytic cells, were used to direct gene expression of a reporter gene specifically to melanoma cells in vitro, and in vivo in mice. Constructs consisting of the promoters and the beta-galactosidase gene were directly injected into mice and the reporter gene was expressed in melanoma cells and in some normal melanocytes but not in surrounding normal tissue. However, tissue-specific promoters will necessarily be limited in the tumours that they can target and will also be liable to target normal cells of the tissue concerned (as was noted in Vile and Hart above).